xml-dev - Re: IDREF

["Michael Kay" <M.H.Kay@eng.icl.co.uk>]

Peter Murray-Rust wrote:
>I am trying to create tools for looking at hyperlink structure within XML
>documents and would like comment on the role of IDREF...

I have been using IDREF to represent relationships within a
genealogical data set, but with considerable reservations
because I would prefer something that extends naturally to
cross-file links using XLL. If I use IDREF I get the benefit of
not having to do the validation myself; if I prefix my IDREF's
with a "#" they become forwards compatible to XLL but I lose
the benefit of validation.

I would be more enthusiastic about the XLL approach if it
wasn't so full of hyperlink behaviour. I want to model a 
relationship between two objects that happen to be in different
datasets. All the XLL stuff about the manner in which links are
followed is to me entirely presentation-oriented and I don't
want it in my data thankyou very much. From that point of
view I prefer the IDREF style of specification which says
nothing about the behavioural characteristics of the link.
What I really need is a "distributed IDREF".

Mike Kay


xml-dev: A list for W3C XML Developers. To post, mailto:xml-dev@ic.ac.uk
Archived as: http://www.lists.ic.ac.uk/hypermail/xml-dev/
To (un)subscribe, mailto:majordomo@ic.ac.uk the following message;
(un)subscribe xml-dev
To subscribe to the digests, mailto:majordomo@ic.ac.uk the following message;
subscribe xml-dev-digest
List coordinator, Henry Rzepa (mailto:rzepa@ic.ac.uk)